Oh my this is the best!!! Absolutely beautiful to place on any table. Easy to make and soooo impressive to serve. Thanks for sharing this recipe. Don't be intimidated by this recipe its easy and well worth the effort.
This turned out to be a very delicious desert; however when baking it did not stay in an 8" circle. After the l l/2 hours it had spread to over a foot and down over the edge of the cookie sheet. I had to serve it by cutting it in pieces (which was very messy--the top kept cracking) and then putting the whip cream and strawberries on. I'd like to know how to keep it from spreading so much.
I have made pavlovas for years and was keen to try this but it was a disaster I knew it was going to spread because after adding the chocolate it lost it's stiff texture and became too soft and it spread like a big pancake can anyone let me know why this might have happened.
This was easy looked elegant and tasted great! Be careful to not overbeat the eggs and mold the sides high as it does spread. I let mine cool in the open oven for an hour then transferred to cooling rack.
The flavor was great but like others mine spread out a lot. This was my first attempt at a pavlova. I thought it might help with the spreading issue so I let the chocolate cool a little before incorporating into the egg whites. I spread the mixture into an 8" circle and piled the sides high but it still ended up about 16" across and maybe 1" tall. Despite my best efforts to make the move smooth and keep the weight evenly distributed the transfer from the baking sheet to the cooling rack was a disaster. It fell apart into huge chunks. I ended up making pavlova parfaits since I was serving to guests. I would avoid trying this recipe for the first time if you're counting on beautiful presentation. Maybe this recipe would work better if you made individual sized pavlovas. They would bake faster and probably not spread out as much. I did notice that this recipe is pretty much the same as the one from the joyofbaking website though they call for superfine sugar instead of table sugar and used chopped chocolate instead of melting it. I bet that would fix the spreading problem. As another reviewer said the egg whites lose their stiffness once the chocolate is added.
Oh wow. This was a complete disaster. Not saying this isn't a great recipe just that it was pretty hard for me who has little experience with beating eggs to get right. I beat the eggs for at least half an hour and they never got stiff. Finally I just gave up thinking that they were probably stiff enough. Everything spread all over the pan (as I expected having read other reviews) the top came out super crispy and cracked and the middle wasn't cooked. Hopefully some better cooks than I can give some helpful advice in their reviews that might make this a less daunting dessert to make.
This was fantastic. Everyone loved it and it has this very rich distinguished yet delicate flavor. I made it for a dinner party and it was very impressive. Do not over bake. (This was my one mistake.)
If you're used to a traditional Pavolva, then this will disappoint--the chocolate does cause it to spread a little, so the result doesn't have the same height, and it has a bit more of a chewy texture than the classic take. But if you don't mind something a little different--and very chocolatey--then, this is perfect! To help minimize spreading, allow your chocolate to cool completely after melting, then lighten it a bit by folding a few spoonfulls of the egg-white mixture into the chocolate before folding the chocolate itself into the egg whites. I also cut the recipe in half and used 1/2 cup superfine baker's sugar and 3 packets of stevia instead of the original sugar measurement. I baked it for 1 hour at 275, let it cool completely, then cut it into wedges and served it in dessert-cups topped with Italian meringue (our replacement for whipped cream, since we don't eat dairy) and macerated berries. The results were gone in minutes. Thank you for the awesome recipe!
Im a really professional chef and i bow down to this recipe!! it is absolutely devine!! it tastes sooo good like a summers morning. I recommend this recipe to every one!!!
